September meeting - From Image to Stitch

After the AGM we enjoyed an interesting talk by Allison James as she took us on a journey through her life in stitching.  Like many of us, when she was young Allison enjoyed lots of crafts and stitching and when she was older she attained a City & Guilds Certificate and Diploma, where she also learned the importance of design.

Allison went on to tell us how her husband's photographs inform her work and have led to inspirational collaborations resulting in several bodies of work.

The 'Leaves' quilt (on the right) was designed by Allison from the atmospheric photographs on the left:

This beautiful quilt - Nature's Necklace - was inspired by the photograph of raindrops suspended in a cobweb.  The raindrops were expressed on the quilt by lines of French knots:

This composite photograph was used to design the quilt below, called 'The disintegration of a dandelion' :

A photograph of trees in autumn was one of the sources for this quilt, using improvisational piecing techniques :

And, finally, a wonderful quilt on the theme of 'In the bleak mid winter':

Allison's talk was very much enjoyed by everyone and was a marvellous start to our 2019-20 programme.

Exhibition at Glossop Railway Station

Our exhibition has been mounted in Glossop Railway station's waiting room.  Most of the embroideries were exhibited at Chatsworth earlier this year.  Here they are:-

The exhibition will be open until the end of October so there is plenty of time to pop along when you are in Glossop.

June meeting - three corners

National Stitch Day

On 22nd June, the Saturday before our meeting, several committee members spent the day in Glossop indoor market explaining the aims and activities of the Guild to anyone who would listen.  A number of people stopped for a chat with some enjoying stitching under Joy's supervision.

Three corners

The branch meeting held on 26 June was 'Three corners': Kantha, Batik and Canvaswork and everyone could take part in the activity of their choice.

The first activity was Kantha, led by Allison James.  Kantha is a traditional form of embroidery practised in Asia and especially in India to re-use old fabrics - recycling at its most creative!  Allison brought along a couple of stitched items including a beautiful jacket made from old kantha quilts, which she wore to the meeting.  She also showed a book of her own researches, illustrating different forms of the stitch.  

Allison brought some beautifully stitched items for inspiration.

- and here are two of the pieces stitched at the meeting.

On another group of  tables, members were busy being shown how to work with batik wax-resist dyeing, led by Ann Cornes.  To make a batik, areas of the cloth are painted out with the resist and then the fabric is painted or dyed with colour.  Ann brought this colourful bag as a skilful example of the technique-

- and members set to work to create their own batiks.  What beautifully coloured samples!

In the third 'corner' a group led by Chris Harris were shown canvaswork, which is a form of counted thread embroidery worked on - you've guessed it - canvas.  Here is a sample which includes a range of different stitches and threads:

Under Chris's expert guidance, members were inspired to create their own work:

Amongst other work displayed at the meeting were these two pieces.  Here is an embroidery in a new travelling book (love the alligator peeping out of the water): 

and this is one of the felted pieces produced at the recent nuno felting workshop held by Valerie Hughes:

Everyone who attended the meeting would like to thank the tutors for their enthusiastic and inspirational help.

May meeting - South African textiles with Catherine Leighton

We were very pleased to welcome Catherine, who brought along a wonderful range of embroidery and other pieces of work which had been inspired by her interest in South African textiles.  She is a regular visitor to South Africa and told us of her love for such a colourful country, and for its tribal arts using hand dyed cloth.

 

Catherine told us of the Kaross embroidery project, which was founded as a way of bringing creative opportunities to mainly rural women.  Their work reflects a passion for colour and for African culture.  One of their products is hand-embroidered cushion covers and Catherine showed us some she had stitched in the style of Kaross.

She then passed around more of her beautifully hand-stitched work for everyone to admire.

Catherine also enjoys making beautiful hand-stitched bags, using space-dyed fabrics:

 

Many thanks to Catherine for such an informative and interesting talk.

Glossop EG at Hollingworth's Festival on the Green

On 12 May members of our committee manned a stall at Hollingworth's Festival on the Green, an event whose aim is to provide low-cost entertainment for all the family.  There are lots of activities on the day, with many craft stalls.

The festival was a great success, enhanced by the glorious sunshine.  Lots of children and their parents stopped at the Guild stall to admire the work on sale, try a bit of stitching or to talk about what we do at Glossop EG.  Thanks to the committee donating their time, we have been able to add to our branch funds. 

Lost and Found workshop with Sarah Burgess - 8 May

This was a wonderful and stimulating workshop with Sarah Burgess, where we printed and stitched on paper and cloth .

Sarah brought examples of her own beautiful work, explaining how it was done, and then gave a demonstration with lots of advice on how to get different types of print.  With this inspiration everyone quickly got started with making their own prints on different types of paper and on fabric.

We were asked to take our own 'found' objects to the workshop for making the prints.  A wide range of objects were used: leaves, feathers, gloves and keys.

Once the prints had been made they were arranged on a length of backing fabric, which could then be embellished with stitch, paint and other found objects to create a unique piece of work.

You can see the different styles of work and how every one is unique.  

We all had a thoroughly enjoyable day.  A big 'thank you' to Sarah for making this possible.  We all went home with plans on how to complete our work.

April meeting - Val Hughes

At our April meeting we were delighted to welcome Val Hughes, a well known textile artist, designer and tutor.  

She brought her 'Water, Snow and Ice' collection of costumes together with beautiful shawls, cloths and wall hangings which were inspired by the weather and the Pennine landscape.  The collection was created for the Charles Henry Foyle Award for Stitched Textiles and then developed for the Madeira Show catwalk.  It was later shown at The Mall Galleries in London with the shawls and cloths used as backdrops in the galleries.

The dress on the left is 'Waterfall' and its intricate construction can be seen in the photo on the right.  Next to 'Waterfall' is 'Snow', constructed from mulberry silk paper and overlaid with crystal organza.  Over the organza are individually free-machine embroidered snowflakes, worked on soluble fabric, with snowflakes freely attached and moving with the dress.  

Here is the final dress in the collection: 'Ice'.  Made from cellophane to reflect the light in the same way as ice, and overlaid with crystal organza, topped with free-machine embroidery.

Following the Madeira Show Val developed the collection with these costumes.    They were created using nuno felting, a technique which bonds wool and other fibres into a sheer fabric such as chiffon or organza, forming a cloth.

The first dress is 'Blue Lagoon' made from discarded samples stitched together.  Next to it are 'Silent Depths' and 'Whispering Shadows'.

Here is a close-up of the top of the bodice of 'Whispering Shadows', showing the complex and intricate work involved.
















Val has also created other costume collections withone of the most well-known being the Anne Boleyn Collection.  If you visit Val's web site you will be able to look at more of her work and read about her journey through textiles: www.valhughes.com